Modelling Passenger Departure Airport Choice: Implicit vs. Explicit Approaches

In this paper different airport choice modelling solutions are investigated. The focus is on the gain which is obtainable by taking explicitly into account an increasing number of those choice dimensions that characterize a generic air trip: departure airport choice dimension only; departure airport and carrier dimensions; airport, carrier and departure time windows dimensions. At this aim a set of random utility discrete choice models were estimated. They cope with a choice-set constituted by airports of different type that compete with one another on medium/short haul trips at a European scale (Naples, Rome Fiumicino and Rome Ciampino). Closed form and heteroscedastic models were investigated and compared. Cross comparison was carried out for each choice dimension; longitudinal comparison was carried out to compare models in terms of airport choice prediction capability.